Tag Archives: Vodafone

The Google phone has arrived! Well, almost. The rumours of its delay were true, but Vodafone is giving you the chance to get your hands on one a few days earlier than its May 5th release. Through the magic of pre-order you can get one now for free, although you’ll be tied to a US$45 a month contract for 18 months. The bad news, it’s only available if you live in the UK. The good news, the Middle East has a thriving grey market. Keep an eye on souq.com.

A mysterious invite appeared in the Stuff mailbag yesterday. Du says it is launching two ‘special’ and ‘new’ products on Sunday. What are they? ‘Black is a mysterious colour,’ says the UAE telecoms company. We’re going to be pretty disappointed if it’s not an iPhone or BlackBerry (with prices to duke it up with Etisalat’s tariffs). Course, if it’s the T-Mobile G1, we’re going to be ecstatic. G2? Now we’re dreaming.

According to Talk Android, Vodafone won’t release the Magic (aka Android G2) until May 1, later than the vague ‘sometime in April’ launch the big V was heading for. Yet the company’s site still maintains that the HTC-made phone is ‘arriving in April’. And Stuff – which has signed up for updates – is yet to hear any word on the new date. Fingers crossed, the rumours are wrong, but we can’t help feeling that Voda should have given us a date by now if it is launching this month. More as we hear it…

Rubbish name, but Vodafone, HTC and Google have got most of it right. The just-announced G2 (though the manufacturer is adamant that we call it the Vodafone Magic) is a sweet piece of smartphone. We´ve just come back from fondling its 3.2in HVGA capacative touchscreen (with genius text input; there´s no keyboard) and we are officially impressed. The digital compass and G-sensor enabled Street View roaming has to be seen to be believed, though we´re a bit put out that we´re back in proprietary headphone territory (no 3.5mm jack socket). Apart from that, it´s running the latest version of Android, which is smoother and smarter than the version running on the G1. Look and feel are amazing, and it will be available immediately for pre-order in black or white (depending on territory, around €99 to €199 with data plan) in Europe. Italy´s going non-exclusive with it, so we should see grey market handsets soon. More details in the next issue of Stuff, out on March 1.

UPDATE: Forgot to mention the camera – bog standard 3.2MP job with no flash; our pics didn´t look great – and the screen, which looks great streaming video from YouTube. Connectivity: HSDPA and Wi-Fi. Don´t say we never tell you anything.